[avusblue]

One more in this club. On my FR-S (production # 2414, delivered May 2012), I’d been noticing a small “burning oil” smell when the car was at a standstill when the engine is hot. (Like, when exiting the freeway and then idling at a stoplight). At first I thought the dealership spilled a little oil the last time I had my oil changed. But it didn’t go away. Never had a drop on the garage floor, and the oil level never diminished, so I just lived with it. The time for my next oil change approached, so I thoroughly checked the engine compartment with a flashlight when the engine and exhaust were at full operating temp -- and lo & behold, I noted a spot on the exhaust manifold for the right side rear cylinder where it looked like oil had been dripping on it. And even a wisp of smoke.

I dropped the car at the Toyota dealership this morning for its oil change, and asked them to look at it. I hadn’t yet searched for or seen this forum thread. An hour or so they called me with this verdict:

“The cam seal on the right cylinder bank is leaking. To replace that gasket, the engine has to come out. We’ll order the parts and schedule another visit for the job. It will take three to four days, so we'll provide a loaner car for you to drive.”

I didn't like that answer. So I conducted a little bit of internet sleuthing (consisting basically of searching on this forum under the keyword “leaking”), and in ten minutes I was convinced that odds were very, very strong that the specific cylinder head blanking plate mentioned in this thread was the issue, versus leaking cam seals. I work right next door to the dealership, so I walked over there and brought the service writer a printout of key postings from this forum thread. I asked him to have the technician look it over and call me directly if he had any questions.

The technician removed the plate, cleaned it up, reinstalled, and torqued the bolts. I’ll give it a couple weeks to see if I encounter the smell again, but here’s hoping that it’s all good.

Toyota should send me some kind of reward, right? My 10 minutes of internet sleuthing saved the company from incurring a major, super expensive, engine remove-and-reinstall warranty claim -- which wouldn’t have even fixed the problem. This job instead took less than an hour of labor plus a tube of special Toyota sealant.

Cheers to the FT86 forum for chalking up another win!